performbuilding

Performbuilding is a term used in contemporary arts and architectural discourse to describe a practice that treats performance and building as interdependent processes. It refers to projects in which the making of a space and the performing of a sequence are conceived together, rather than in sequence. Proponents argue that the method reveals how spaces are inhabited and how social relations are choreographed within built environments.

Practices include site-specific performances staged within or around real construction sites, installations where performers physically manipulate or move modular components, and choreographies designed around scaffolding, walls, or other build elements. Performbuilding often involves collaboration among dancers, actors, architects, scenographers, and engineers, with inputs from carpenters or fabricators. Methods emphasize process as content: rehearsals may occur during assembly, deconstruction, or adaptive reconfiguration of structures, while audience participation can occur as part of the spatial unfolding.

Purpose centers on making visible the labor, time, and materiality of space production, challenging the boundary between artwork and infrastructure, and inviting visitors to experience space as a performative act. It can operate as criticism of modernist efficiency or as exploration of kinesthetic relations to place.

Safety, logistics, and site permissions are central considerations, and critics caution that performbuilding risks instrumentalizing workers or blurring lines between art and construction. Related terms include site-specific theatre, performance art, performativity, dramaturgy in architecture, and built environment discourse.